


Mirror, Mirror

by KaiahAurora



Series: Random Drabbles [1]
Category: No Fandom
Genre: I Don't Even Know, I thought it was interesting, Like, Really dark, Self-Harm, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2018-08-08 22:38:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7776433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaiahAurora/pseuds/KaiahAurora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if our reflections were just another version of ourselves? What if, one day, you say your reflection blink?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirror, Mirror

Everyone has a reflection; someone who’s identical to them in every way. They do the same things as you, feel the same things as you, and think the same things as you. In theory. I was five years old when I first realized that something was different. After one of my gloriously fabulous face-plants on the pavement, I was inspecting my newly black-and-blue skin when I noticed something was off. This one smudge of dirt on my cheek, which I could just see on my face, was not present on that of my reflection.It was only when I blinked, though, and opened my eyes to see my reflection still examining her cheek that I registered exactly what was happening.

Naturally, as a five-year-old, it was the coolest revelation ever. I ran to the study to grab my mom, which would’ve been fine if my reflection hadn’t done the same. In the bathroom, there was nothing I could do to when it came apparent that my mom and her reflection were perfectly in sync, and my own doppelganger in the glass was reacting the exact same as I was. Even down to the placement of the tears that fell from my eyes like rain as I tried to explain that it _wasn’t_ a lie, that I _didn’t_ make it all up.

I spent the next week trying to find some difference between us, which was infuriating, as my reflection was doing the same. Now, of course, I realize that this is because we’re the same person, living in parallel dimensions or what have you. It’s insanely rare for one’s reflection to be different from you, and most people who see it happen go a little… insane.

It was on my next birthday, when I was fixing my princess tiara in the mirror, that I saw a bit of glitter near my ear. As I reached to rub it off, my hand came away clean, even though I could clearly see the stuff on my reflection. Her eyes flickered between her fingers and mine, just as I did, and our eyes met. Slowly, she raised her hand, as I did mine, and we compared. We were exactly the same, except for those few sparkles which proved that we were right.

The next few years were tough, to say the least. Most of it was just having a secret that no one else knew about, and that no one would ever believe. However, there were problems as my reflection and I drifted our separate ways. We lived the exact same lives, did the exact same things, but every once in a while, one of us would do something the other didn’t. The bit of glue stuck to my hair, the mark of pen on her hand, leading on to the cuts on her arm that I couldn’t bring myself to do.

I was nine when we discovered that we could talk to each other. It was the weirdest feeling, talking to your reflection and getting an answer, especially since we almost always thought of the same things at the same time. So, when we were fourteen and more and more marks started appearing on her arms, I made a point of sitting with her for an hour each day. It wasn’t just that I was worried about her – because I was, obviously – but it was also a major concert to us as to what would happen if someone in her world found out about the cuts. Would their counterpart in my world react the same way? Would they go their separate ways? We didn’t even want to consider what would happen if one of us died if the other didn’t. As much as I loved the girl who shared my face, my thoughts, and my dreams, I wasn’t sure I could bring myself to die if she disappeared.

So, it was just over two weeks ago that everything changed. I was working on a project in my room, glancing in the mirror every so often to make sure she was doing the same – I’d taken the liberty of adding as many reflective surfaces to my life as possible – when she got up and walked towards me. Immediately, I did the same. It was her day to lead, after all. As we’d quickly found out, we had to take turns mirroring the other, so to speak. In any case, she sat quietly on the bed. I waited, knowing she had something to say. I’m terrible at reading people, we both are, but with each other it’s just as tough as listening to your own thoughts.

“I’ve been thinking,” she started slowly.

“Never a good sign,” I said, trying to keep the mood light. “You know what happens when we think.”

“I can’t keep doing this.”

She starts to cry, and so do I. It’s not even conscious, anymore.

“Listen,” I said slowly, trying to think for the both of us, “It has to get better sooner or later. I know it’s tough, but just hold on a little longer.” I give her a half-smile. “I like this world, and I know you do, too. Please don’t screw this up for the both of us.”

“We should just run off and live in the woods in a weird naturist communism,” she mutters, but I know she’s okay. I’d had that thought just two hours earlier.

“Now,” I declared grandly, “Let us continue on the excitingness that is math homework.”

She was about to reply when there was a knock on our doors.

“Sweetie?” our mom’s voices said simultaneously, “Who are you talking to?”

“No one,” we replied as one, not even needing to look at each other, “Just rehearsing a few lines. I’m thinking of trying out for the school theatre. They’re going Disney.”

We stared gloomily into each other’s eyes for a bit before getting back to work. It didn’t feel awkward, never has, but there’s still the knowledge that we were getting to be more and more different. We’d almost been caught more times than is safe; had to do things for each other more times than is healthy. She knelt on salt for half an hour to replicate a scrape on my knee from our first disastrous skateboarding attempt. We replaced our wardrobes with long sleeves so no one can see the differences in our arms, more specifically the marks on hers.

We knew it was a dangerous game. But we were fifteen, for god’s sake! I wasn’t prepared when it happened though. It was late at night, and she cried. Barely able to speak, all I caught from her sobs was that she was sorry. That she couldn’t handle it. Our parents were out, so I was fully able to scream at her when I saw the knife. That was one thing that she always did in private. I tried, god I tried, to make her stop, to think about what she was doing. I couldn’t bring myself to move when she did it, but I was able to be there for her, at least, when no one else was. Who would have thought that the person I was closest to was my own reflection?

I knew that it would be a few hours until our parents were home. I knew that it was too late for her. So, I sat there, bound by more even than a duty to myself, until she fell asleep. Running to the kitchen to grab a knife of my own, I returned just in time to see the last rise and fall of her chest. In that moment, I had a choice to make. In the end, it was obvious. As crappy as our world were, they were the same, and I didn’t want to chance seeing what would happen to one of us if the other was gone. The butterfly effect was something of an area of expertise in the life of a reflection.

No one could blame me for lack of trying. At least, they couldn’t, if they’d had the faintest idea of why I’d done it. The only thing was, the few hours’ difference that had separated her and me had made all the difference. When her parents burst into her room to find their only daughter dead on the floor, mine found me, bleeding out but still breathing. Still conscious enough, even, to be the only one to see the difference in our worlds. While everyone was screaming, my dad ran to the kitchen to grab the phone, my mom to the bathroom to find some towels to stop the bleeding, I just stared at her parents. They were kneeling, screaming, crying, cradling her head in their laps, but they knew it was hopeless. They could have so easily have been my parents, their daughter me.

I honestly never expected to wake up, and when I did, I admit that I wasn’t too happy about it. My parents asked why I did it, and how could I explain? My other half was gone, my reflection no longer, and I was alone. They put me in a psyche ward, where I had to explain in a lot of detail to three separate psychologists that no, I was not mentally unstable and yes, I understood the implications of what I’d done. I was actually impressed that I only had to reveal my secret to the last one. I showed her that I didn’t have a reflection and, to both our surprise, neither did she. We then went on a trek through the hospital to find her counterpart, who ended up being at her desk doing paperwork.

I was discharged the next day. There wasn’t really anything else she could do, seeing as she was on the verge of a mental breakdown herself. I then had to fix all the rest of the problems I’d created. Or rather, the ones I’d failed to solve. My parents were the first to get the news. My mom, who had already seen herself walking through my room, was a lot more accepting than I thought she’d be, and only went off to be sick. My dad was harder to convince, though at least he didn’t run to the bathroom to throw up when the realization hit. He just punched the wall a few times. The funeral was that day, and we all agreed we should go. It was torture, seeing our friends and families crying in the reflections of the gravestones, one of which should have been mine. My parents cried, both for her and for me, and I joined them. The worst part was I knew they were happy that it was her and not me. No, the worst part that I was as well. I’d been feeling just as down and just as lost as she had, but she’d been the one to take the plunge, alone.

I took down the names of all the people who appeared at the funeral. I’d probably need to keep tabs on them. I wondered what I’d say to my best friend, Ryan, as to why he looked like total crap in the mirror when his self in this world wasn’t concerned by anything more than the next science test. My parents promised me they’d work it out, that we’d get through it somehow. I brushed my teeth and my hair using the screen of my smartphone, as I’d discovered early on that cameras were very much not glimpses into other dimensions, and as such were the only places I could see myself looking back at me.

The worst moments were when her parents saw me. The freaked out, and it took hours and a few runs around the house for my parents and I to calm them down. What followed was a two hour crying-fest in which we all said we were sorry at least a dozen times, and her parents thanked me for being there, as if I had a choice. We talked for a long time, making sure we all understood that the closer we stuck to the same path, the better the world would be. I gave them the number of my psychologist, knowing that they could use help from someone who had just met her own personal doppelganger. It was hard to make them stay, to force them to understand that they had to look at their dead daughter’s ghost every day for the rest of their lives just so the world didn’t implode or something. I would be able to help them, at least, maintain the delusion that she’s sort of still alive. I can’t tell if she is, or I’m not.

I don’t know what will happen in the future. Everyone who’s come in contact with the mess that is my life has not walked away the same. Many more people are aware of their reflections now, and all of them will have to face the same challenge I did for ten years of my life. I’m going to have to deal with a different problem, now. Living one’s life without a reflection is not something I’d ever wanted to have to do. I need to stop thinking of it as “us”, but “me”. It’s been “we”, ever since that smudge of glitter set us apart. I’m not sure if I can keep going on my own. But I’ll manage, because I have to. I’ll manage because one of us needs to survive. And it can’t be her. So it’ll have to be me.


End file.
